Xbox SmartGlass Features Overview

Xbox SmartGlass is the latest Tech that comes from Redmond based company, Microsoft, announced at the yearly Gaming conference, E3.

SmartGlass technology lets you add a second screen which can be any of smartphone or tablet running Windows 8, Android, or iOS iPad.

Xbox SmartGlass lets you use smartphone, Tablet as gaming controller, remote control for media, as well as displays extra info related to the content being shown on the primary screen: TV.

However, it has its limitations, at least at this point of time when video content will need to be either downloaded or app-streamed by apps that support SmartGlass. Windows 7 tablets aren’t supported as yet, but who owns them anyway?

To work with a video, the content or app will have to be designed to interface with Xbox SmartGlass.

The first thing they demonstrated was the ability to watch movies on multiple devices, seamlessly. Basically, you could watch something on one device and easily transfer the film to another, picking up from where you left off easily. The ability to indulge in tasty bonus content pertaining to the film or show that you’re watching was also demonstrated.

Web browsing with SmartGlass would become easier on Xbox. You could use your finger to move a cursor around, tap-to-click, and even use gestures such as pinch to zoom. As I and several others on Twitter noticed, it did appear that the demo of this was not performed live, as his fingers did not seem to be synchronized with what was happening on screen.

Remote Control Gaming with SmartGlass

Game of Thrones was demoed to work with a smartphone remote and we admire the responsiveness and super low lag between touching the second screen and triggering playback on the TV. It will also work with upcoming game, Ascend: New Gods, where your phone/tablet acts as a tiny map with animated features and icons. A future baseball game called Home Run Stars was discussed as well, where one player would call up plays on a tablet while another would pitch in the air and swing a bat via Kinect.

SmartGlass will work with up to four connected devices at once, according to the reps, which suggests multi-player games with dedicated screens or controls.

Microsoft is leaving plenty of scope for the developers to come up with great ideas. They will be open to some creative work from developers around the world. The app will be free, and reps believe that such apps would be easy to get approved to App Stores like iOS.

The SmartGlass app would be compact and small. The real creativity is yet to be seen.